Lauren Fensterstock Explained

Lauren Fensterstock
Birth Date:10 March 1975
Birth Place:Towson, Maryland
Nationality:American
Alma Mater:BFA: Parsons School of Design
MFA: SUNY New Paltz
Spouse:Aaron T Stephan

Lauren Fensterstock is an American artist, writer, curator, critic, and educator living and working in Portland, Maine. Fensterstock’s work has been widely shown nationally at venues such as the John Michael Kohler Art Center (WI),[1] the Bowdoin College Museum of Art (ME),[2] the Portland Museum of Art (ME),[3] [4] and is held in public and private collections throughout the U.S, Europe, and Asia.

Education

Fensterstock received her Bachelor of Fine Arts from Parsons School of Design in New York, New York in 1997[5] where she studied with Lisa Gralnick.[6] She went on to receive her Master of Fine Arts from SUNY-New Paltz in New Paltz, New York in 2000[5] where she studied with Myra Mimlitsch-Gray[7] and Jamie Bennett.[8]

Professional experience

Fensterstock currently works as a critic at the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD) in the graduate Jewelry + Metalsmithing department.[5] Fensterstock has held previous teaching appointments at the Maine College of Art, New Hampshire Institute of Art, Vermont College, SUNY New Paltz, and as a visiting critic for several institutions.[9] [10] Fensterstock served as professorial chair at the Lamar Dodd School of Art during the 2017-2018 academic year.[11] Along with teaching, Fensterstock also worked in an administrative capacity, and served as the Academic Director of the MFA program at the Maine College of Art from 2010-2012.[12]

Fensterstock has worked as a curator throughout her career. Most notably she served as the interim director at the Institute of Contemporary Art at the Maine College of Art,[13] the director of Hay Gallery (Portland, ME),[14] as the Exhibitions Developer for the Saco Museum (Saco, ME),[15] and as a guest curator for several exhibitions nationwide.[12]

Fensterstock has written for a variety of publications including Metalsmith Magazine,[16] ''Maine Magazine'',[17] Art New England,[18] [19] [20] [21] [22] [23] [24] [25] [26] [27] [28] [29] Maine Arts Magazine,[30] and numerous catalog essays.[31] [32] [33] [34] [35] [36] In addition to writing, Fensterstock served as the Maine State Editor for Art New England from 2005-2007, and the Associate Editor for Arts Guide Portland from 2005-2007.

Selected series and artwork

Precious Heirlooms 2004-2010

Fensterstock’s training in metalsmithing and jewelry dominated her early work that centered on conversations about adornment, beauty, preciousness, and ephemerality.[37] In her series Precarious Heirlooms, Fensterstock utilized such materials as potatoes, bananas, and soap, setting precious stones and pearls in the materials. The temporary nature of these base materials changed the pieces over time; the soap dried and cracked, the potatoes shriveled and grew tendril-like sprouts, and the banana rotted, turning black and deflated. Fensterstock documented these changes, referring to them as What Happens.[37]

Third Nature 2007-2014

Fensterstock’s long-running series, Third Nature utilized the process of quilling (curling and shaping fine strips of paper that construct decorative designs) which she combined with material such as Plexiglas and charcoal to create enclosed standalone sculptures. After purchasing her first home, Fensterstock was struck by how specific her ideas on how her garden “should” be.[38] This led Fensterstock to research historic landscape design and theory, how people have interacted with the land through such implements as the Claude Glass, and how people actively shape the land around them.[39] The result of this research is Fensterstock’s series Third Nature which is marked by its “monochromatic iterations of nature and gardens”[40] that are enclosed and contained in various boxes, vitrines, and wall panels.

Installations 2008-2014

Fensterstock built upon the research and themes of Third Nature in a series of site-specific installation projects. Fensterstock installed and showed these projects at such venues as the Bowdoin College Museum of Art,[41] Walker Contemporary,[42] the Ogunquit Museum of American Art,[38] and the John Michael Kohler Arts Center.[43] [44] Fensterstock’s shift in scale accommodated additional influences and conversations such as the influences of minimalist artist Donald Judd and land artist Robert Smithson.[40] [45]

Grottoes 2014-2018

This body of Fensterstock's work moved away from the quilled floral designs that marked her long-running Third Nature series and her installation work, and towards "cavernous pieces that imitate stalagmites and stalactites."[46] Fensterstock explains the impetus for the shift in work for Interview Magazine:

For the last few years, I've been doing a lot of work with paper and looking at the history of garden designs, the ways different styles represent different ideas about man's role in the world. The differences between a Baroque garden and a picturesque garden represent two completely different world views. I kept coming across garden grottoes, which are artificial caves, and I became obsessed with them because it's this blend of culture and nature. It's in a natural space, but it's really an augmented natural space. Sometimes they would take, in the 18th century, a cave and reform it, cover the entire surface with shells or another kind of ornament, and create a space that really merged nature and culture.[46]
With this new body of work also came new materials; shells coated and dripping in black rubber replaced the daintily curling paper to create ominous stalagmites and stalactites. The first piece of this series, Stalagmite, debuted at Pulse Miami in 2015.[46]

The totality of time lusters the dusk 2019–present

Fensterstock was invited to create a site-specific work for the 2020 Renwick Invitational, ''Forces of Nature'', at the Smithsonian. The work, The totality of time lusters the dusk was informed by the 16th-century illuminated manuscript the Augsburg Book of Miracles. On October 13, 2020, she was a speaker at the virtual preview of Forces of Nature: Renwick Invitational 2020.[47]

Selected exhibitions

Solo exhibitions

Two/three person exhibitions

Select group exhibitions

Public collections

Recognitions and awards

External links

Notes and References

  1. Web site: JMKAC. jmkac.org.
  2. Web site: Past Exhibitions - Bowdoin College Museum of Art. bowdoin.edu.
  3. Web site: Directors' Cut: Selections from the Maine Art Museum Trail. portlandmuseum.org.
  4. Web site: 2013 Portland Museum of Art Biennial: Piece Work. portlandmuseum.org.
  5. Web site: Lauren Fensterstock - Jewelry Metalsmithing - Academics - RISD. risd.edu.
  6. Web site: Lisa Gralnick. wisconsinacademy.org. 10 October 2013 .
  7. Web site: Artist wins prestigious fellowship grant. bluestonepress.net.
  8. Web site: Jamie Bennett: Contemplative Jeweler - SUNY New Paltz News. newpaltz.edu.
  9. Web site: Visiting Artist / Scholar Lecture Series. uga.edu. 2015-07-17. https://web.archive.org/web/20150721225935/http://art.uga.edu/programs/lectures/visiting-artist-scholar-lecture-series/lecture-presenters/visiting-artist-scholar-lecture-lauren-fensterstock. 2015-07-21. dead.
  10. Web site: Exhibits. illinois.edu.
  11. Web site: Dodd Chairs . Lamar Dodd School of Art . 1 March 2019.
  12. Web site: Lauren Fensterstock . July 17, 2015 . dead . https://web.archive.org/web/20150721045456/http://s3.otherpeoplespixels.com/sites/19741/laurenfensterstock.com-1432827887.pdf . July 21, 2015 .
  13. Web site: Society notebook: So happy together. The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram. 16 May 2010 .
  14. Web site: Sam Pfeifle . Features | GALLERY NEWS . Portlandphoenix.com . 2016-02-17.
  15. Web site: Sense of discovery Portland artist translates life into tangible forms — Archive — BDN Maine archive — BDN Maine. The Bangor Daily News.
  16. Fensterstock, Lauren. “Into the Cave.” Metalsmith Magazine. January 2015. Print.
  17. Fensterstock, Lauren. “See: Shira Neumann.” Maine Magazine. November 2011. Print
  18. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Surviving in Northern New England." Art New England. June/July 2007. Print.
  19. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Fresh Paint, New Media." Art New England. April/May 2007. Print.
  20. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Found." Art New England. February/ March 2007. Print.
  21. Fensterstock, Lauren. "The Maine Print Project." Art New England. December/January 2007. Print.
  22. Fensterstock, Lauren. "John Whalley." Art New England. August/September 2006. Print.
  23. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Josephina Auslender." Art New England. June/July 2006. Print.
  24. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Unveiled." Art New England. February/March 2006. Print.
  25. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Dozier Bell." Art New England. February/March 2006. Print.
  26. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Anya Lewis." Art New England. June/July 2005. Print.
  27. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Eve Peri: Fiber Artist." Art New England. June/July 2005. Print.
  28. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Between Science and Art." Art New England. April / May 2005. Print.
  29. Fensterstock, Lauren. "Light in the Dark." Art New England. April / May 2005. Print
  30. Fensterstock, Lauren. The Next 25 Years of Percent For Art. Maine Arts Magazine. Winter 2004. Print.
  31. Fensterstock, Lauren.Maysey Craddock: Ruin (catalog essay). Memphis: David Lusk Gallery, 2012. Print.
  32. Fensterstock, Lauren. Builders of Pasts and Futures (catalog essay). Belgium: Elisa Platteau & Cie Gallerie, Belgium, 2012. Print.
  33. Fensterstock, Lauren. A Meticulous Ferment. (catalog essay). Portland Maine: Institute Of Contemporary Art at MECA, 2010. Print.
  34. Fensterstock, Lauren. Last Day. (essay) Jim Campbell: Material Light. Edited by Steve Deitz. Germany: Hatje Cantz, Ostfildern. 2010. Print.
  35. Fensterstock, Lauren. The Fetish Garden (essay). Portland, ME: The Hay Gallery. 2003. Print.
  36. Fensterstock, Lauren. Gathering Tiers: The Work of Judith Allen (catalog essay). Athens Greece: Jill Yakas Gallery. 2003. Print.
  37. Web site: Lauren Fensterstock. themainemag.com.
  38. Web site: Black beauty. The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram. 24 April 2011 .
  39. Web site: Lauren Fensterstock's black gardens. 1315 MASS MoCA Way. 2015-07-17. https://web.archive.org/web/20150721113029/http://independentartprojects.com/lauren-fensterstocks-monochromatic-paper-based-gardens/. 2015-07-21. dead.
  40. Web site: Forays and Follies Presents the Dark and Romantic World of Lauren Fensterstock. DrexelNow. 2 July 2015 .
  41. Web site: ?Parterre? grounds gallery — The Bowdoin Orient. The Bowdoin Orient.
  42. Web site: Audience Calendar. The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram. 26 June 2011 .
  43. Web site: Review: 'Uncommon Ground' at the Kohler Center. Mary Louise Schumacher. jsonline.com.
  44. Web site: OnMilwaukee.com Arts & Entertainment: 'Uncommon Ground' brings the natural world inside. OnMilwaukee.com. 14 July 2013 .
  45. Web site: Lauren Fensterstock brings the outside in - Museum And Gallery . Thephoenix.com . 2011-05-18 . 2016-02-17.
  46. Web site: Unearthing Gardens. Interview Magazine. 2 March 2015 .
  47. Web site: Forces of Nature: Renwick Invitational 2020 Virtual Preview. 2020-10-13. events.bizzabo.com. en.
  48. Web site: The Top Nine Trending Artists Under 40 in Miami. artsy.net. December 2014 .
  49. Web site: The Maine/Miami art connection. The Portland Press Herald / Maine Sunday Telegram. 14 December 2014 .
  50. Web site: Maine Arts Commission Announces 2010 Fellowship Awardees. Brenda Bonneville. MAINE ART SCENE MAGAZINE - CULTURAL EVENTS. 16 September 2009 .

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